CHAPTER FIVE
"Rivers."
"We've got a body in the steam tunnels under downtown." Kate's voice was crisp, fully alert despite the early hour. "Duluth PD called it in as a suspicious death. I need you and Sullivan on scene."
Isla was already sitting up, reaching for the clothes she'd laid out the night before—a habit from her Miami days that had never left her. "What makes it suspicious?"
"Victim is a city employee who had no reason to be down there at night. Security footage shows he entered the tunnels voluntarily, but the circumstances around his death are... unusual." Kate paused. "The responding officers requested FBI involvement. They think we might be looking at a homicide."
Isla's pulse quickened as she pulled on her clothes, phone wedged between her shoulder and ear. "I'm fifteen minutes out."
"Sullivan's already en route. Access Point 7, near the harbor. You can't miss the emergency vehicles."
The call ended, and Isla moved through her apartment with practiced efficiency.
Blazer, badge, weapon, keys. Her hair went into its usual ponytail, though she didn't bother with the escaping strands that immediately framed her face.
The bathroom mirror showed her the same tired eyes she'd seen last night, amber irises reflecting the harsh overhead light.
A body in the steam tunnels. Not Brune's MO—he preferred the open water, the staged accidents near the docks. But after two weeks of dead-end sightings and fruitless searches, any suspicious death in Duluth made her pulse spike with anticipation and dread.
The December morning was brutally cold, the kind of cold that turned her breath to fog the instant she stepped outside.
The parking garage's concrete amplified the chill, and Isla's fingers felt stiff as she unlocked her Bureau-issued sedan.
The engine protested briefly before turning over, and she sat for thirty seconds letting it warm while pulling up the location on her phone's GPS.
Access Point 7. She knew it vaguely—one of the older tunnel entrances near the industrial district, not far from where she'd confronted Brune two weeks ago. The proximity sent a chill through her that had nothing to do with the temperature.
The streets were mostly empty at this hour, just the early shift workers and snow plows making their rounds.
Duluth was waking slowly, lights beginning to appear in windows as the city stirred toward consciousness.
Isla drove faster than she probably should, her mind already cataloging possibilities.
A city employee dead in the steam tunnels.
For some reason entered, but died under unusual circumstances.
What constituted "unusual" in an environment already filled with hazards?
The tunnels carried superheated steam and water—there were a hundred ways someone could die down there through accident or carelessness.
But the Duluth PD didn't call in the FBI for routine accidents.
She spotted the emergency vehicles from two blocks away—patrol cars, an ambulance, a fire truck, their lights painting the pre-dawn darkness in strobing reds and blues.
The scene was contained behind yellow tape, and a cluster of first responders stood near what looked like a steel access door set into the side of a concrete building.
Isla parked behind one of the patrol cars and stepped out into air that bit at her exposed skin.
She'd grabbed her heavy winter coat this time—the one James had convinced her to buy last year after watching her shiver through too many outdoor crime scenes.
The memory of his concern warmed her slightly as she approached the perimeter.
A uniformed officer intercepted her, young and looking slightly overwhelmed by the scene. "Ma'am, this is a restricted—"
Isla held up her FBI credentials. "Special Agent Rivers. SAC Channing sent me."
Recognition flickered across his face—whether from her name or the press conference yesterday, she couldn't tell. "Yes, ma'am. Agent Sullivan is already inside with Lieutenant Morrison. They're waiting for you before they move the body."
"What can you tell me about the victim?"
"David Langford, forty-three, pipe fitter with Public Works." The officer consulted his notepad, his breath forming clouds in the frigid air. "Jerry Walsh—another city employee—found him during a routine inspection around 5:20 AM. Walsh called it in immediately."
"Where's Walsh now?"
"Ambulance. He wasn't injured, but he was pretty shaken up. Paramedics are checking him for heat exhaustion—apparently it's like a sauna down there."
Isla filed that detail away. "And the body's still in the tunnels?"
"Yes, ma'am. The medical examiner went down about twenty minutes ago, but they haven't extracted it yet. They're waiting for your assessment before they move anything."
Standard procedure for a suspicious death, but it meant she'd have to go down into those tunnels. Into the heat and the enclosed spaces where someone had died under circumstances unusual enough to warrant federal involvement.
Isla's jaw tightened with resolve. "Show me the entrance."
The officer led her to the steel door, which stood propped open despite the cold. A wave of humid air rolled out, incongruous against the December morning. Isla could see metal stairs descending into artificial light, and she heard voices echoing from below—James's steady baritone among them.
"The main body site is about two hundred yards in," the officer explained. "Section D-8, whatever that means. The guys from Public Works can give you better directions, but Agent Sullivan has someone guiding him."
"Thank you." Isla adjusted her coat, knowing she'd need to shed it once she was inside, and started down the stairs.
The heat hit her like a physical wall about halfway down, and by the time she reached the bottom, she understood why the paramedics had been concerned about Walsh.
The temperature was oppressive, the air thick with humidity that made breathing feel like work.
Isla immediately unzipped her coat, pulling it off and draping it over one arm.
The tunnel stretched in both directions, illuminated by bare bulbs that created pools of light separated by shadows.
Massive pipes ran along the walls and ceiling, wrapped in aged insulation and radiating warmth that made the concrete walls glisten with condensation.
The smell was distinctive—hot metal, damp concrete, and something else she couldn't quite identify. Something that didn't belong.
James appeared from the left branch of the tunnel, his considerable frame ducking slightly to clear a low-hanging pipe.
His face was flushed from the heat, his usually neat hair slightly disheveled, and he'd already removed his suit jacket and rolled up his shirtsleeves.
Relief flickered across his features when he spotted her.
"Isla." He closed the distance between them with a few long strides. "This one's weird."
"Define weird."
"Come see for yourself." He glanced at her coat. "You'll want to leave that here. It only gets hotter the deeper we go."
Isla hung her coat on a hook near the base of the stairs, where several other jackets already waited. She checked her weapon—still secure in its holster—and followed James into the left branch of the tunnel.
The heat intensified as they progressed, and Isla felt sweat begin to form along her hairline.
The tunnel narrowed, forcing them to move single-file, and Isla became acutely aware of the enclosed space pressing in around them.
This was nothing like the open docks where Brune had operated.
This was confined, claustrophobic, a maze of pipes and concrete where you could get turned around if you didn't know the layout.
"How far in?" she asked.
"About fifty more yards. Walsh found him in a maintenance chamber off the main corridor." James's voice echoed slightly off the walls. "Medical examiner's already down there. Dr. Henley."
Isla knew Patricia Henley well, had worked numerous cases with her over the past three years. She was thorough, experienced, and not prone to dramatic assessments. If Henley thought something was unusual enough to hold the body in place for FBI review, that meant something.
The corridor opened into a wider space where more people had gathered.
Isla recognized Lieutenant Frank Morrison from Duluth PD, a solid investigator in his fifties who'd been cooperative on previous cases.
He stood talking quietly with a woman in Public Works coveralls—probably someone from the maintenance department who knew the tunnel system.
Two crime scene technicians were setting up lights and equipment, their movements careful in the confined space.
And there, slumped against the far wall beneath a massive steam pipe, was David Langford's body.
Isla stopped at the threshold of the maintenance chamber, her investigator's instincts immediately cataloging details while her stomach tightened with the recognition of death.
Dr. Henley crouched beside the body, her examination kit spread out on the concrete floor, her gloved hands paused mid-motion as she looked up at Isla's arrival.
"Agent Rivers." Henley's voice was professionally neutral, but Isla caught the edge of something else beneath it. Confusion, maybe. Or concern. "I'm glad you're here. This one's giving me trouble."
Isla moved closer, stepping carefully around the equipment the crime scene techs had set up. The heat in this chamber was almost unbearable, radiating from the pipes with an intensity that made the air shimmer. Her shirt was already sticking to her back, and she felt sweat trickling down her spine.
But she barely noticed the discomfort once she got a clear look at David Langford's body.